This invention relates to a printing device, and more particularly, to a printing device capable of confirming a print area prior to executing an actual printing operation so that an operator is able to select a suitable sheet form.
Conventionally, a printing device such as an electronic typewriter has been provided with a print head unit operated for printing characters, symbols and/or figures on a printing medium such as a paper sheet. The print head unit is mounted on a carriage so as to be movable by a carriage drive mechanism in a direction perpendicular to a sheet feed direction.
Further, recent electronic typewriters have been arranged such that right and left margins as well as top and bottom margins can be freely set so far as it is physically allowed. This makes it possible to execute a printing operation in consideration of the interval ruled lines, and the length of a header or a footer, provided on a printed form sheet.
However, when a text data, for instance, which has already been prepared and stored in a text file memory is to be printed out, it is necessary to confirm the margins of the print area, having been set, of the text file to decide on the type of the print sheet for use. That is, without specifying how wide the margins of print area are, printing may go outside the print sheet or over the header or the footer.
In order to solve the above problem, selection of the sheet type may be done by checking the file information on a display before a printing operation is executed. For instance, the text itself may be shown on the display or the values assigned to the margins may be indicated, whereby the result of printing can be estimated by referring to the scale provided on a printer. However, a real state of printing could hardly be obtained by this way, because it has been unlikely that the carriage is moved exactly as indicated by the values or the indication on the display because of possible hardware errors or software incompatibilities.